


Cake

by GWhite



Category: Stargate SG-1
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-20
Updated: 2019-10-20
Packaged: 2020-12-27 03:54:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,233
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21112241
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GWhite/pseuds/GWhite
Summary: Jack O’Neill finds a sweet surprise in the conference room, and all SG1 wants to talk about is PX10-2052.





	Cake

**Author's Note:**

> I’ve been holding on to this for awhile, and almost missed the day to post it - well, where I live anyway. It’s just a bit of fun, not meant to be serious. But then, it is a special day for Jack.

Cake

Jack took the stairs from the command center to the conference room and office as fast as his bad knee would let him. Damn. No way was he getting as out of shape as Doc said he was. So what if his BDUs were a little tight around the waist. Just a few extra minutes in the gym every day and he’d zap that little love handle Doc called a insipient fat roll. Of course, it had been easier staying fit when he was in the field all the time. He used to do his best thinking on the elliptical. Who needed a desk anyway? His mind wondered off as he took the last steps what if you could put a desk top and an elliptical together? He shook that thought off as he hit the last step and started across the room.  
There it was. Right in the middle of the conference table. Big as life. Well, maybe not that big, but big enough. He groaned. It was smack in the middle of the table. No way could he miss it. All three glorious layers, slathered with chocolate icing, under a glass dome that had a half piece of paper with a typed note taped to the top. It said emphatically, “IF THIS ISN’T YOUR CAKE, DON’T EVEN THINK ABOUT IT”.  
“Just one little taste,” he thought, ignoring the warning voice in his ear, his fingers inching toward the knob on top of the dome, then jerking back as he heard footsteps on the stairs. “Damn,” he muttered, quick-stepping it into his office, thinking a general shouldn’t be caught with his fingers in the icing.  
He plopped into his chair just as Walter knocked on the door frame. “General, sir,” he said observing the proprieties, and not entering until he heard Jack’s gruff, “Come”. He advanced into the room, stopping at the side of Jack’s desk. “Just a few reqs, sir”, he said, and dropped a couple of folders in the middle of Jack’s desk.  
“Alright, Walter,” Jack sighed. He hated this paper pushing garbage, but it had to be done. “Anything there I need to read?” he said, picking up his pen, glancing up and raising a brow.  
“Just the usual end-of-the-month stuff, I think, sir, but I thought you might want to sign them today and not have to deal with them first thing Monday morning,” Walter responded, knowing his general well. Monday was going to be a big day. “No surprises, sir”.  
“Ok. Wait. You can take them with you,” Jack said. If Walter said they were routine, that was fine with him and he dashed his John Hancock on each one, thankful for the paperclip Walter had placed next to the appropriate block. General-ing was so much easier with Walter there.  
Jack glanced at another folder on his desk. Doc had handed him that one after his physical. Diet information. Which reminded him. “Walter, that cake out there?”  
“Cake, sir?”  
“The one on the table in the conference room? The big, chocolate one?” he gestured toward the door and lifted a brow.  
“Sorry, sir. I didn’t notice.” Walter retreated toward the door, folder of signed requisitions in hand. “Is there anything else I can do for you, sir?”  
Suppressing the desire to order him to find out who belonged to the cake, Jack shook his head and grunted “No. Thank you, Walter,”  
“Yes, sir. Close the door, sir?”  
“No, leave it”.  
“Yes, sir.”  
Jack watched as Walter crossed the conference room without even glancing toward that cake. He tapped his pen a few times and dropped it on the desk. How could anyone not notice that cake? He pushed back his chair and stepped to the open door. Yep. Still there. He advanced cautiously, on full alert for any noise that might indicate someone was coming. He reached out toward the dome again, his fingers brushing the note. He winced. IF THIS ISN’T YOUR CAKE, DON’T EVEN THINK ABOUT IT. Ok. He’d just pull that dome up a bit and breathe deep. Getting a whiff wasn’t like sticking a finger in the icing, after all, and there were no calories in air. Grinning at this logic, he carefully lifted the dome and, “Drat”. More steps coming up the stairs. He didn’t even have time to duck into his office, so he took a quick step toward the window overlooking the Stargate, trying not to look as if he’d had his fingers in the cookie jar, er, cake.  
It was Daniel and Teal’c. “Jack,” Daniel said when he saw him, “I found something weird in this raw data we got from PX10-2052. I thought you might want to take a look”. He raised a hand to push up his glasses, then moved quickly to grab the papers he’d let go of before they dropped to the floor.  
Teal’c raised one eyebrow at Daniel, then tilted his head toward Jack, who understood him to mean he agreed.  
“PX10-2052?” Jack lifted a brow. “Refresh my memory.” He asked, torn between having no recollection of PX10-2052 and having to ask Daniel an opened ended question. He grimaced as Daniel began spreading the papers and a few pictures of a foggy landscape at the end of the table. Jack bent to look at them more closely, hoping something would jog his memory, but The Cake and its warning note were in his line of sight.  
“PX10-2052. Sent A MALP and a drone early this morning?” Daniel asked, apparently distracted from his train of thought. He glanced up. “Jack?”  
Jack raised a questioning brow.  
“Well,” Daniel said, gathering up the papers, “Like I said. Weird. Data doesn’t match the pics the drone sent back.”  
“Carter see it yet?” Jack asked, inadvertently looking at the dome. “I have a lot on my plate”. Did he really say that? On his plate? He winced., trying not to look at The Cake.  
“Sir, Daniel brought this to me, and I told him you needed to see it right away since you said PX10-2052 was a particular concern” said Carter from the top of the stairs. “Sorry, Daniel. I know I said I’d be right here, but Corporal Jansen stopped me with a question”.  
“Ok, Carter. Let’s have it,” Jack said, grimacing, still not remembering anything about PX10-2052, sending a MALP or even discussing it, and tying to pay attention to what she was saying and not keep looking at The Cake.  
“Yes, sir,” she said, ignoring the papers Daniel had spread out and walking up to the wall mounted computer to call up a foggy picture. “PX10-2052 is supposed to be uninhabited. The MALP didn’t pick up any signs of life in its scan, but if you look at this area” she pointed to a fuzzy shape just off center,” you can tell its darker, and well, domed-shaped, not natural at all. The atmosphere isn’t conducive to any life, sir, but there’s no doubt there is something, something not natural, there.”  
Jack looked closer yet again. Sure enough. There was the dome shape, almost lost in a fog of some kind. It reminded him of something. Something he’d seen recently. Something like … cake. He shook his head to clear the thought. “And?”  
“And, sir, we think we should check it out,” Carter said, walking back to the table.  
“Yes,” Jack said, his mind elsewhere again. “Yes. Check. By all means”. He glanced once again at The Cake, which was now between him and Carter. Now That was something he really wanted to check out. The cake. Not Carter, he thought, mentally shaking that thought off. Looking down the table he saw The Note.  
Carter looked at Daniel and Teal’c. “Yes, sir”. Daniel gathered up the mess and they headed toward the door, having been dismissed by a wave. “General” she said, turning back.  
“Yes?”  
“I think we should go there. PX10-2052 appears to be something special.”  
“Uh, yes. Apparently so.” He just wished he remember why he was interested in it in the first place. His mind was back on The Cake.  
“Uh, mmm, Carter,”  
“Sir?”  
He gestured at The Cake. “Whose?”  
A frown creased her brow. “Sir, I don’t know, “she said, barely giving it a look. “Maybe there’s something special today? Shall I ask Walter on my way out? Maybe he knows.”  
“No. No. Just curious,” he said, pretending nonchalance and knowing it hadn’t worked. He knew they knew about Cake. Everyone knew about Cake. Except him. The Man.  
Funny, he thought to himself as they cleared the room. He still couldn’t quite place any recent mission to PX10-2052, wherever the heck that was, even with just a MALP. Daniel was likely to stumble into his office any old time, but Carter never brought anything she wasn’t concerned about, especially now she was in commanding SG1, and Teal’c was unusually quiet, even for him. He shrugged his shoulders and stepped close to the table, reaching out his hand. Yep. It was happening. His grip tightened on the knob and he started to lift the dome.  
“Sir” It clunked when he dropped it and he winced. Caught. Nope. Not caught. It was Carter, at the top of the stairs again, looking down at one more piece of paper.  
“Yes?” he inquired.  
“I was just wondering, sir, if you would like to come with us to PX10-2052?”  
That would be fun. He was ready for some fun. And cake. “Maybe. Depends. Timing.”  
“Yes, sir. Of course.” She was already retreating down the stairs. He watched a minute, listening for returning footsteps.  
OK. Cake. Dome. Operation Lift and Sniff now underway. He reached. He touched. He lifted. He breathed Chocolate, his mind paraphrasing Neil Armstrong. “That’s one small whiff for a man, one bit of heaven for the nose”. He dropped the dome back down and contemplated that Note again. IF THIS ISN’T YOUR CAKE, DON’T EVEN THINK ABOUT IT. He sighed. He went into his office, closed the door and sat at his desk. There was always paperwork for him to do. At least with the door closed he couldn’t see the darn thing. Someone was going to have a party. Or something, and he didn’t have an invitation. And it was his conference room. And he still couldn’t place PX10-2052.  
“O’Neill”, he said, distractedly, answering the base phone, not the red one, about two hours later. Must have been about the twenty millionth call in the last two hours. He hadn’t looked at The Cake once, but its presence lurked there, on the edge of his mind.  
“Carter here, sir. We are heading out to PX10-2052 in about an hour. Looks like that dome shape is only a click or two away from the MALP, so it should be a quick in and back, if we don’t find any other surprises.”  
“K. You have a go”  
“Sir, want to go along? PX10-2052 is high on your priority list.”  
His lips twisted wryly. What would Carter think if he told her he didn’t have a clue about PX10-2052 and its oddities. “Uh, no. Can’t. Bad timing. Bring back what you can”. He put down the receiver, hearing her, “Of course, sir,” just before it hit the cradle. Not that it wouldn’t have been fun., but Walter had brought another stack of general-ing stuff he had to go through.  
It was almost an hour later when the voices on the other side of the door interrupted him. He heard the dome scraping as it was lifted, and he caught a whiff of chocolate. He stood, on alert. Cake. Someone was cutting the cake. Maybe he could sneak a piece? He opened the door. Carter, Daniel, and Teal’c, obviously not ready for gate travel, and Walter and Siler were standing by the table, looking pleased with themselves.  
“PX10-2052?”  
Carter bit her lip and ducked he head, Daniel pushed his hair back and Teal’c gave that little head bow. “Indeed,” he said. “Happy birthday, General O’Neill”.  
“Happy birthday, sir,” the rest said in unison.  
“My cake?” he asked, grinning. “My. Cake?”  
“We knew you’d never leave it alone if you knew it was for your birthday, sir and we weren’t sure when we could all get here,” Carter said. Daniel added, “and Teal’c and I had a bet….”  
“Daniel Jackson, PX10-2052 was your idea.”  
“Wait. What” Jack asked, suspicion wrinkling his brow.  
“PX10-2052, sir,” said Carter. “10.20.52. Your birthdate, sir.”  
“And the fuzzy dome picture thingy was the cake. Carter’s idea.’” Daniel threw in as Walter, ever efficient, put plates on the table. “You really didn’t catch on, Jack? We dropped hints enough times.”  
“Hmmph,” said Jack, as Teal’c turned to Daniel and said “General O’Neill did not disturb the icing. I believe I win.”  
Jack looked at each of them, happy to know that the general thing hadn’t stopped them from pranking, hadn’t changed their friendship. “Thank you all. Nice touch, that PX10-2052 dome thing. Walter, we may need to talk about your part in this,” he said, swiping a finger through the icing. “Mmmmm. Double chocolate. I’ll take that piece.” He glanced back into his office. “I’ll be right back.”  
He went to his desk, picked up the folder of diet info and dumped it in File 13. Love handles could just wait.  
“Mmmmm, cake, “he said, watching Walter cut through the layers. “My favorite”.


End file.
